No one, I presume, can read this passage and yet hesitate to admit that he is here listening to Eusebius “ad Marinum” over again. But if any one really retains a particle of doubt on the subject, he is requested to cast his eye to the foot of the present page; and even an unlearned reader, [pg 063] surveying the originals with attention, may easily convince himself that Victor is here nothing else but a copyist.[113] That the work in which Eusebius reconciles “seeming discrepancies in the Evangelical narratives,” was actually lying open before Victor while he wrote, is ascertained beyond dispute. He is observed in his next ensuing Comment to quote from it, and to mention Eusebius as its author. At the end of the present note he has a significant allusion to Eusebius:—“I [pg 064] know very well,” he says, “what has been suggested by those who are at the pains to remove the apparent inconsistencies in this place.”[114] But when writing on S. Mark xvi. 9-20, he does more. After abridging, (as his manner is,) what Eusebius explains with such tedious emphasis, (giving the substance of five columns in about three times as many lines,) he adopts the exact expressions of Eusebius,—follows him in his very mistakes,—and finally transcribes his words. The reader is therefore requested to bear in mind that what he has been listening to is not the testimony of Victor at all: but the testimony of Eusebius. This is but one more echo therefore of a passage of which we are all beginning by this time to be weary; so exceedingly rash are the statements with which it is introduced, so utterly preposterous the proposed method of remedying a difficulty which proves after all to be purely imaginary.
What then is the testimony of Victor? Does he offer any independent statement on the question in dispute, from which his own private opinion (though nowhere stated) may be lawfully inferred? Yes indeed. Victor, though frequently a Transcriber only, is observed every now and then to come forward in his own person, and deliver his individual sentiment.[115] But nowhere throughout his work does he deliver such remarkable testimony as in this place. Hear him!
“Notwithstanding that in very many copies of the present Gospel, the passage beginning, ‘Now when [Jesus] was risen early the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene,’ be not found,—(certain individuals having supposed it to be spurious,)—yet we, at all events, inasmuch as in very many we have discovered it to exist, have, out of accurate copies, subjoined also the account of our Lord's Ascension, (following the words ‘for they were afraid,’) in conformity with the Palestinian exemplar of Mark [pg 065] which exhibits the Gospel verity: that is to say, from the words, ‘Now when [Jesus] was risen early the first day of the week,’ &c., down to ‘with signs following. Amen.’[116]—And with these words Victor of Antioch brings his Commentary on S. Mark to an end.”
Here then we find it roundly stated by a highly intelligent Father, writing in the first half of the vth century,—
(1.) That the reason why the last Twelve Verses of S. Mark are absent from some ancient copies of his Gospel is because they have been deliberately omitted by Copyists:
(2.) That the ground for such omission was the subjective judgment of individuals,—not the result of any appeal to documentary evidence. Victor, therefore, clearly held that the Verses in question had been expunged in consequence of their (seeming) inconsistency with what is met with in the other Gospels:
(3.) That he, on the other hand, had convinced himself by reference to “very many” and “accurate” copies, that the verses in question are genuine:
(4.) That in particular the Palestinian Copy, which enjoyed the reputation of “exhibiting the genuine text of S. Mark,” contained the Verses in dispute.—To Opinion, therefore, Victor opposes Authority. He makes his appeal to the most trustworthy documentary evidence with which he is acquainted; and the deliberate testimony which he delivers is a complete counterpoise and antidote to the loose phrases of Eusebius on the same subject:
(5.) That in consequence of all this, following the Palestinian Exemplar, he had from accurate copies furnished his own work with the Twelve Verses in dispute;—which is a categorical refutation of the statement frequently met with that the work of Victor of Antioch is without them.
We are now at liberty to sum up; and to review the progress which has been hitherto made in this Inquiry.